Youth care is under pressure. The number of young people with care needs continues to grow, while the number of treatment providers lags behind. Waiting times are increasing, caregivers are losing valuable time to administration and young people often have to tell the same story multiple times. Gerbrand van de Beek (Mental Care Group) and Arjan Karens (Bettr Health) explain how client tracking system Mindlinq offers breathing room.
With 600 employees across 46 offices, Mentaal Beter Jong, part of the Mental Care Group, sees the challenges in youth care on a daily basis. "The biggest frustration among practitioners is lack of insight - who was involved with which client when? A system that links that data is lacking," saysGerbrand van de Beek, Chief Digital Officer at Mental Care Group.
From frustration to innovation
More than two years ago, Mental Care Group, in collaboration with health platform Bettr Health, therefore developed software to provide a solution for this. The result became Mindlinq, which basically does three things:
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- Het volgen van cliënten: bij welke zorgaanbieder is een cliënt aangemeld? Dit gebeurt op basis van data uit de ECD’s
- Het digitaal matchen met de juiste zorgaanbieder: bij welke zorgaanbieder past de cliënt het beste?
- Het bieden van inzichten: hoeveel cliënten zijn naar welke zorgaanbieder verwezen en wanneer? Voor hoe lang staan welke cliënten op een wachtlijst?
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The goal of Mindlinq is to support healthcare providers in delivering the right care, in the right place, for the right client. Van de Beek: "We want to make it run as smoothly as possible from intake to treatment. We want to prevent young people and their parents from having to submit the same information over and over again. That's frustrating for them, and for practitioners."
Also read:Will data solve waiting lists in youth care?
Pragmatic and learning approach
According toArjan Karens, founder of Bettr Health, in the pragmatic approach of developers and users working together. "We look at how healthcare providers work, what they encounter on a daily basis and improve the system from their starting point."
Whereas previously clients were manually matched to the right care provider, through folders on tables during meetings, through Mindlinq this is largely automatic. Care providers fill out standardized forms that come together during so-called digital matching tables.
The standardized forms make it possible to match clients faster and better. The latter is also currently done manually (still), which is intentional. "This way we learn what works and what can be done better. Perhaps a predictive model will be added in the future, but first the basics have to be right," Karens says.
Healthcare providers are positive
After The Hague, Mindlinq is now also launched inRotterdamused. So far, more than 10,000 clients have already been included in the platform and about 3,000 clients have been successfully referred to the right care provider.
Mindlinq not only helps clients get to the right place faster, healthcare providers also benefit: where administrative processing used to take up to half an hour, it now takes about ten minutes. This time saving also contributes to cost savings (not entirely unimportant) because unnecessary duplications and delays in the healthcare process are avoided.
"The biggest difference is that there are fewer mistakes. No information can get lost. This used to lead to children not getting the right care, but then it would not be discovered until months later," said a healthcare provider who uses the platform.
Also read:Mindlinq streamlines youth care chain
Future of youth care
With all the challenges in mind, what should the design of youth care look like? That search for solutions is the focus of the youth care event on Feb. 10, organized by Mental Care Group, in collaboration with Bettr Health and Therapieland.
The event will feature (international) examples of digital innovations and smart collaborations, such asKoothfrom the United Kingdom andInjebol.nl. For better, faster and affordable youth care, collaboration and innovations are indispensable.
Van de Beek and Karens will speak about the impact of Mindlinq. Van de Beek: "We can talk for a long time about all the problems, but that won't make youth better. We want to convey a positive story to policy makers, with national and international examples. We are organizing this event with the thought: it can be done."
More information and sign up can be found via theMental Care Group website.
